ENGC 1013

Thoreau chooses to conduct his experiment in the woods because he wanted to live away from society, where it was only him and nature to see what living was all about, living off the land instead of depending on others to survive. He believes that to live your entire life within man made structures and luxury’s you may miss what life is all about. So he retreats to the woods to get away from it all, and to truly live life.
By moving into the woods and out of the village he had previously lived, it allowed him to slow things down, and get away from all of the haste and hurry of modern life. It allowed enjoy the morning hours, wake when he wanted to and enjoy the quite surroundings of nature. In a village, that wasn’t possible, everyone needed to go someplace, or do something to survive. By slowing down his life, it brought him even closer to nature than simply just living in the woods because he had the time to enjoy his surroundings, to watch and to listen and to really enjoy his life.
I think that there is a certain connection to nature that you can only get by being completely surrounded by nature. I don’t think you need to completely move away from society in the woods to fell it like Thoreau did, but maybe just a weekend camping of even a hike in the woods to just get a feeling that there is more to life than just the man made world we live in, and that we are all part of nature. That is why I think he choose to conduct his experiment in the woods, just so he could feel more attached to nature.